PT:Floor 10
by ChrisWorld
Summary: Chris, after a creative block, has a perfect idea for a Floor design. Him and Kiyoko have a stab at completing the Floor, but can all this hardship and choices be worth the fun?
1. Chapter 1

Chris was spending time during a free talking to Kiyoko over his iPhone. She was curious as to what Chris had in mind for new Floor's in Platform Tower; there were a few ideas that Chris had in mind, but none had any potential for being any fun.

Chris always brought up the possibility that Kiyoko could try and come up with an idea, but she thought the idea preposterous, saying that her ideas were nothing compared to anything that he could conjure up.

He had been alone for part of the free, since Aver and Pamela had headed off into the library to do some studying. He had forgotten which of the others may have also had a free with him. So he was busy 'talking on the phone', which was what he called it when anyone approached him.

Burch ambled silently over to Chris and sat beside him.

"I honestly can't think of any more ideas, K!" Chris rested his head on his arms, folded on the table. "This never happens! I always have at least _one _idea when it comes to Floor ideas."

"But you have loads of ideas! You just don't want to use any of them." She was belated in the response, but it truthful; albeit not the best one she could have thought of.

"Mreegh…." Chris groaned, sinking his face in between his arms. There was nothing he could think of, he was completely strapped for ideas.

Burch took the other earphone and began to listen to the silence. The two weren't saying much, Kiyoko was lying in bed trying to think of an idea, and Chris was slumped forward into his arms trying at least something.

"Can you talk to Kiyoko while she's in PT now?" Burch had gotten the idea that Chris could contact Platform Tower; which was a peculiar idea. The plain idea of trying to get phone signals to travel to a different dimension, even when the portal to it was open, was completely absurd.

"What?" Chris lifted his head up. "You actually think that I can talk to people over dimensions?" he smiled slightly, thinking Burch a bit stupid. Kiyoko started going into hysterics, she could hear Burch over the speaker in the earphone wire.

"It's not that?"

"No, Burch! Chris developed an app for the iPhone to connect up to the main terminal in the Platform Tower lobby. He's able to store me in the app, and talk to me when outside of Platform Tower. When he closes the app, I switch off and wake up when he switches back into it." It was better that Kiyoko had explained it rather than Chris, because if Chris had explained it, he would have had to whisper making him seem very conspicuous.

Chris smiled quickly at Burch and rested his head back into his arms. Burch was waiting for one of them to say something, but there was nothing, not for a while at least. Kiyoko eventually broke the silence with a cuss.

"Ah cobbleswash…" she grumbled.

"What's up?" Chris mumbled back, head still down in his arms.

"I just lost the game…" she groaned.

"Kiyoko!" Chris quickly sat upwards, annoyed at Kiyoko on the fact that she lost. "Oh wait!" inspiration suddenly struck. He took out his notebook and pencil case from his bag. He opened the notebook, finding a blank page, he then began to write.

Burch looked over to what he was writing; it was in some kind of computer terminology that looked like only Chris could understand. He could understand the occasional phrase, like 'Hero' or 'Will', and something that stuck out at him was 'Guild'. Strangely enough, he couldn't pinpoint where the word may have come from. He knew that the idea that Chris was working on wasn't a 'KiyokoTek Production' or whatever he called it, and if he remembered what code he had used when creating Floor 7, it was a fairly popular type of 'Non-KiyokoTek Production'.

"Hey, Kiyoko…" Burch started, getting Kiyoko's attention. "Can you understand Chris's code that he uses for PT?"

"Yeah I understand it. It's programmed into me. Tell me some of it from the start, Chris will be in a sort of trance while he's writing code for the Tower, even while in the Lobby next to me." She sighed. She wasn't entirely sure why Chris would block everything out when writing code; maybe it was intentional so he could focus. She could imagine Chris doing that, but there was also the possibility that he just was so engrossed in a new idea, that he just blanked everything else around him.

"Okay…" Burch leaned over to see the first line of code. "C5N1211- Erm… *Hero*L35K4- What's that-… *Will*J6ISTL*Guild*-… That's the first line. What does that mean?" he sat back into his seat, still watching over Chris' jumbled scrawl.

"Hold on… I always find start-up code difficult, and sometimes Chris gets it wrong… I think it means, 'Create for world. Narration for majority of life by Blind Seer. Narrator is active NPC in world.' What's that next bit… 'Will is magic of world. NPC of world not used to Will, scared by Will. Will from ancient magic building known as Guild.' Oh, that's interesting… I suppose if you didn't know better, it could be misconstruted as being the Wile Archipelago. But it's not because of the NPC's being scared of the magic…"

"It's misconstrued…" Burch corrected her mispronunciation.

"Gotcha. But that sounds like such an awesome idea! How much code has he written?"

Burch hesitated before speaking. He was thinking of correcting her again, but he thought that it was probably just best for both of them if he just told Chris later to upgrade her punctuation. "He's just turned over to the next page."

"Really?" she was flabbergasted. Chris doesn't often write that much code for a basic idea, not even for Floor 6. He must have been planning the full idea on sheets of paper, and having the Main Control center to scan it later.

"Hold please." Chris ripped out the paper of code he had just wrote in his book and handed it to Burch. Before Burch could take it, Chris let go of it, letting it drop in front of his fellow crew member. As quick as Chris had dropped the paper in front of Burch, he was scrawling code on the next sheet.

"What does it mean when Chris puts, 'Find on web' in brackets?" Burch peered over to few things that Chris had scrawled over the paper; it seemed that there was some code between the occasional pieces of 'Find on web'.

"Ohh! This must be an idea for a Floor that already exists as something!" Kiyoko giggled, entertained by the fact that she was going to play something else that already existed as something in the real world.

"Exists already?"

"Just means its non-Chris created."

"It still doesn't make sense…"

Later that day, Chris was inside the Lobby of Platform Tower, Kiyoko was watching Chris scan the sheets of code into the Main Control center. Kiyoko still didn't know what Chris had in mind for the Floor, but she knew it was good. When the two had been talking, Kiyoko had been bringing up the idea of Floor 10 just on the off-chance that Chris would spill the beans. It wasn't working.

As Chris inserted the last sheet of paper into the fax like scanner, he started to speak.

"So you really want to know what the idea for Floor 10 is?" he turned around and leant on the keyboard of the Main Control center.

"More than anything! TEMME'!" she exclaimed, exaggerating her excitement for the situation, bouncing in her seat.

"Okay, search Fable 2 on your Internet." Chris folded his arms, awaiting Kiyoko's reaction.

"M'kay." She paused. She began to search through her head, connecting herself to the Tower's Internet, finding any and all information on Fable 2, including the entire storyline. After a few seconds, a tear ran down her cheek.

"What's wrong?" Chris cocked his head, curious as to why Kiyoko had just shed a tear; of joy or anguish he didn't know.

She was suddenly sounding slightly morbid. "That's… That's such a good plotline." She spoke through her shuddering breaths. "It's so beautiful." She hung her head, and began crying into her hands.

"Why are you crying, K?" Chris stood up and hugged Kiyoko while she was still seated. "Is the story that good?" Chris had remembered at some points in her lifetime, Kiyoko had cried over good storylines, such as that for Floor 4, but she had never cried into her hands before.

"It's just so sad! Everything that happens… But it's _so _good…" she nudged Chris away, and dried away her tears. "Alright! Set up the forms!" she was back to normal, off her seat with a bounce and all. "Let's get this sucker started up!"

"That's the spirit!" Chris had picked up on the good mood. He turned around back to the Main Control Center. The MCPU was able to find data from the Internet, which filled in the whole's in Chris's code. It was mostly maps for locations that Chris couldn't remember off the top of his head, which is every location that is in Fable 2.

A form for Chris and Kiyoko loaded up onto Main Control Centre's screen. There wasn't much information that the two could fill in, all there was, was the ability to fill in both of their names, and tick the box for them to remember everything or nothing of the events in Fable 2. Chris ticked the box before getting started.

As Chris clicked into the box where they would fill in their names, the hand-print scanner opened up beside the keyboard, so as Chris and Kiyoko could scan in their hands, so the Floor would recognize them as each other.

Chris typed in his name, and allowed his hand to be scanned on the scanner. He then typed in Kiyoko's and allowed her to do the same. The form was then sent away, and the information was loaded in the Floor, and the elevator.

"Okay! Since everything's done with that, it shouldn't take too long before the doors open." Chris turned back around to face Kiyoko. "This is an all-nighter. I reckon if we go at a fast pace, we may get to Brightwood. But what's the fun in that?"

"Heck yeah!" Kiyoko agreed, raising her fist in compliance.

"Yeah! We're gonna coast through the Floor, having fun at every turn!" he then knew that he said the wrong thing. "Most turns…"

"Most turns…" Kiyoko agreed, sharpening her gaze at Chris.

There was a long and awkward silence between them, Chris had the urge to do the Awkward Turtle, but it might not have been the best time. Kiyoko looked like she was about to burst into tears again. The entire theme of loss was very hard for Kiyoko; it was an emotion she had picked up, post-programming.

The elevator binged and the doors swung open. The Floor was done, and ready for them to enjoy.


	2. Chapter 2

"Sparrow? Little Sparrow?" a voice was echoing around in Chris' mind. Everywhere else was black, he had his eyes closed. He opened one of them slightly, to see what he might have been hearing, but a strange figure stood over him.

It was definitely an NPC, he could tell that much for sure, but she looked very unique. Traditionally the NPC's were very basic scripture, very basic looking. But she had a completely different look about her.

She wore Pauper clothes for a start, and she was young. She had to be at least 14 or 15, no older than that. Her hair was tied up in pigtails, which seemed peculiar for her age. Her fringe was tied back by a pinkish-reddish bandana.

Chris didn't remember adding her in the code. The MCPU must have added her in to make the game more interesting.

"Come on, Little Sparrow! Kiyoko's been calling for you all morning!" she seemed awfully upbeat, considering the condition they were in.

Chris sat up slowly, trying to take in his surroundings. He was sleeping on a little quilt – using it as a bed, in a little shack at the back of someone's house – it looked like it may have been a shed, before being used as a house, built for two – and it was snowing.

Chris himself was only in a Pauper's t-shirt, Pauper's shorts and a pair of Pauper's shoes. He was freezing in the cold weather! He wondered how this random person managed to survive.

A name and title perpetuated in Chris' mind. It seemed to fit who this person might be. It was-…

"Rose. You're Rose. My sister." He spoke slowly, and quietly.

"Of course I am, Little Sparrow! I'm Rose, your older sister, and you're Chris, my little brother!" she picked Chris up, allowing him to stand on his two feet. He felt smaller than usual. "Let's get you to the fire, Sparrow! You look freezing!" Rose guided Chris to a small bonfire in a metal cylinder; it was probably used as a bin at one point. "Here you go, Sparrow. You warm yourself up."

Chris put his hands near the fire, feeling the warmth against his hands. He got closer, the warmth intensified. His hands began to burn slightly and he pulled them away. He put them on his face, still confused by the complexity of the world. Not having the slightest idea what might be going on. He didn't even know what Floor in Platform Tower this might be.

"Doesn't Castle Fairfax look beautiful in the snow?" she craned her head around, hearing someone come up behind them. "Oh here comes Kiyoko now, Sparrow!" Rose pointed to behind them, Chris turned around to who he might see.

It was Kiyoko.

She was dressed in a frilly, pink bonnet, housing clean black hair, tied in a ponytail. Below that, was a long frilly, pink dress. Arms encased in bulky pink sleeves, and legs stuffed into thick, pink tights. Her hands and feet were hidden behind big, thick, pink gloves, and big, thick pink boots. She seemed to be the same size as Chris, so a foot and a bit shorter than Rose.

She had a look of chaos and confusion on her face; eyes wide with devastation.

Chris was trying too hard not to laugh.

"Hey, Kiyoko! How are you doing?" Rose rubbed her hands against each other, while keeping close to the fire. She had only turned her head.

"Not very good…" Kiyoko seemed to waddle over to in between the two, the same expression blown across her face.

"What's wrong?" Rose was concerned. As far as she knew, Kiyoko was a perfectly happy little girl, living with a perfectly happy rich family, which completely objected to her going out into Bowerstone Old Town, and mixing with the poor locals.

"I appear to be a walking Porcelain Doll." She seemed to be talking rather calm, especially for the situation that was occurring. Though her face looked as pale as a ghost.

"But you always wear that Kiyoko." Rose laughed slightly.

"Err, Rose? Can me and Kiyoko talk for a bit?" Chris quickly interjected between the two girls conversation, worried that Kiyoko may suddenly start to burst into rage, throwing off every shred of clothing that she may have had on her.

"Sure! Just don't do anything naughty while I'm gone…" Rose began to amble down the street from where Kiyoko had come from. There was a large crowd gathering at the bottom, near a sort of vending store.

Chris began to talk as soon as he thought Rose was out of earshot. "Alright, I have no idea what's going on. I can't even remember what Floor this is, but we just have to remain calm. Remember, this is Emergency Protocol 1, we gave ourselves false memories, and we can't remember what should happen in this Floor. We just have to act normal."

"But I'm wearing frills. Not even sheep, F-R-I-L-L-S!" Kiyoko felt the need to spell out the word that she detested so much for some reason.

"Yeah, I know. Not my idea. But that's my sister down there!" he pointed to where he thought Rose might have gone. "I don't have any memory of her; I just know that she's my sister." Chris looked over at his back, seeing that he had a toy wooden sword in some sort of leather holster. "Here. Take this." He took the weapon off of his back, and handed it to Kiyoko.

"Why are you giving me your toy sword?" she seemed suddenly over-emotional. "You always have your toy sword… You never let go of it. You helped me from those thugs when we were little…" she began to cry. "Why am I crying? How do I know that?"

"I don't know…" Chris looked down at the sword. "But I remember the situation, sort of. How is that possible? It never existed! I know it never existed. But it feels so real…"

"Protocol 1?" she cried through her tears of confusion.

"I think so…" Chris nodded, trying to hold back his own tears of confusion. "Come on, let's forget about that. Take the sword and we'll go follow Rose." He held the toy sword out further, forcing Kiyoko to take it. She slung the leather strap over her shoulder, the holster for the sword banged on the small of her back. "Alright, let's go after Rose." Chris turned around, looking down the street. "Looks like there's something big going on!"

The two ran down the street, it seemed suddenly darker as the two ran into the shadow of the tall buildings. Kiyoko looked up in wonder; she had never felt so small. Chris was more focused on the ever growing crowd at the bottom of the street. He could see some sort of carriage, one of the walls had been knocked down and it was facing out towards the crowd. Inside was a few counter-tops, one had a music box on top of it, and the other side had a full length mirror.

"He's been going on for a while now, Little Sparrow. But I can't hear a thing!" Rose was standing on her tip toes trying to get a look at the stall, but the crowd was all people that were taller than the three.

"And finally, this magical music box, with the powa to grant the user One Wish!" the seller of the items seemed to have a slight speech impediment. It seemed that he could not pronounce the letter R, and said W instead.

"That sounds like absolute rubbish. It's just a worthless piece of plastic. I bet the ring on the box doesn't even work." Rose turned her body to face Chris and Kiyoko. They felt different to how Rose felt.

"I don't know, Rose… The music box looks really special." Chris was the first to say something, as the crowd began to thin the three were able to see the box easier.

A tear fell from Kiyoko's cheek, it splashed on the ground, causing a small sound, but load enough for Chris and Rose to hear. Their vision darted to her, and she was staring at the music box on the stand, tears streaming down her face.

"K?" Chris was really concerned as to why Kiyoko was crying. He immediately leaned over to hug her. She hugged him back – the best she could do with the amount of frilly and pink clothing on – crying into his neck, more than crying, sobbing. She couldn't stop crying.

"Oh my God, Kiyoko…" Rose was just as worried as Chris was about why Kiyoko was crying, but she remained still, behind Chris, just watching, eyes wide, over his shoulder.

"You are right young Chris," An elderly woman, wearing a red hood. Most of her face was covered by the shadow created by the hood, but her eyes were completely visible through the shadow. They seemed to glow a bright white.

Chris looked around to see who was talking to him. She seemed extremely familiar to him. Her name was on the tip of his tongue. Kiyoko immediately stopped crying when she saw who was talking to her. She let go of Chris, and looked up to her face.

"That box is more special than you can imagine. It is only 5 Gold Coins; don't you think that's a fair trade for eternal happiness?" she didn't move from her position, she was still looking down at Chris, Kiyoko and Rose. "I'll let you think about it." The woman walked away, down towards the Bowerstone Market.

"Maybe we could make a wish to go to Castle Fairfax, to live in Castle Fairfax! How wonderful would that be?" Rose seemed convinced. Unusual, since to begin with she was completely sceptical of the idea of a Magic Wishing Music Box.

"I bet there are some jobs to do around town! We could get 1 Gold Coin for each of the jobs we do!" Kiyoko had completely forgotten that she was crying, and her mood was completely different, focused on getting the Music Box.

"Yeah! There has to be hundreds of stuff we could do!" Chris ran ahead, a bit past the stall. The town seemed to open out a bit, to the right of him was a wide trail leading to a closed gate, the blind woman seemed to have walked down here. Before the trail to the Bowerstone Market, there was a guard box at the far side of the trail, with a lone guard standing inside. He had an expression of worry across his face.

Chris walked up to him. "Hey, what's wrong, sir?" he asked.

Rose ran up next to him.

"I've lost these five warrants for different crimes. They're probably scattered all over the Old Town. I can't go fetch them, because I have to stay at my post." He was caught between two rocks.

"We could help! Means you don't have to leave your post if we get them." Chris suggested. He wasn't concerned with getting Gold; he just wanted to do a Good Deed for the sake of doing a Good Deed.

"Ye-Yeah! We'll find them. But we want some Gold for finding them all." Rose wanted to get the Music Box, and they needed money to do that. So doing Good Deed's, and getting money for them seemed like a good idea.

"Oh…" the guard groaned. "Under ordinary circumstances, I wouldn't do this. But these are extraordinary circumstances. If you find them all, I'll give you 1 Gold Piece."

"Done!" Rose was happy that she was getting closer to getting the Music Box, and Chris was happy to be doing a Good Deed.

"Chris, Rose!" Kiyoko ran from the left of them, she seemed strangely happy about something. Chris and Rose turned to face her. She slowed down to a stop just before reaching them. "There's this guy over there," she pointed to behind her, "He says he'll pay us a Gold piece if we let him take a picture of us!"

"Just a photo?" Chris was a bit wary of what the man's intentions might be. The three began to walk up a large stage, a camera with a cloak behind and a man was standing in front of the staging. The background on the stage looked like a long wood in the middle of autumn. All the leaves on the trees were orange or brown, and most of them were on the floor.

"Hello! My name's Barnum and I'm just immensely happy that you offered to get a image captured!" the man gestured to the three children, and then to the staging.

Chris seemed a little less nervous of being in the presence of him. He didn't look the type to take a dirty interest in children. He seemed like a perfectly pleasant gentleman. Chris nearly skipped onto the stage. It was another Good Deed, for all he was concerned.

Kiyoko jumped up after him, and then Rose walked to the stairway, and up onto the stage.

"Okay, now strike a pose for three seconds, and the image capturing device will capture your image." Barnum stood underneath the cloak, readying the camera to take a picture.

Rose struck a pose, facing left, head craned towards the camera. Her right arm was placed on her hip, and her left arm was left dangling down the side of her body. The camera flashed.

Rose was prepared, which was fortunate for her because she could then look good in the photo. Chris was too busy thinking of something to pose as, so he had a look of extreme thought, his tongue was sticking to the side of his mouth and he wasn't even looking at the camera. Kiyoko had tripped over her dress, and the photo had taken just as Kiyoko was half way through falling over.

"That was… Interesting…" Barnum came out from underneath the cloak.

Chris was slightly annoyed. Barnum hadn't warned him of when he was taking the picture. He was judging whether to do a little dance, or to hold his thumb up. Kiyoko was really annoyed at her dress, and had half-a-mind to rip it apart, but then she would be cold. Rose was proud of herself, for posing in such a great way that she was able to take a fantastic picture, just for Barnum. However when she saw Chris picking up Kiyoko, she started to imagine what the rest of the photo may have looked like. So she laughed.

"Thank you for having me capture you image! The image will take 3 months to develify, and I will mail it to you!" Barnum was then taunted when saying that. To the majority of Albion, 3 months was a very long time.

Kiyoko jumped off the stage to Barnum, he gave her the 1 Gold coin. When she received the coin, she walked past Barnum, very smug with herself. Chris and Rose walked off the stage, over to Kiyoko. Kiyoko wouldn't let go of the Gold Coin, she was happily parading around the town, holding it high.

She turned down into a dark alleyway, and at the end she turned left. Chris and Rose ran after her, both worried that someone might storm past her and take the Gold coin. Before Chris and Rose could get to the end of the alleyway, Kiyoko ran back, panicked by something.

She pointed down where she had come from. Her eyes were wide, like she had seen something that she couldn't believe was happening. Chris and Rose could hear some jeering and some gasps from what sounded like young children, but they had to look to make sure.

Chris skidded around the corner first, after Kiyoko, seeing a group of small children – about 2 inches shorter than Chris and Kiyoko – crowded around a boy – that may have been a bit older than Chris and Kiyoko, but a few years younger than Rose – crouched down, taunting something on the ground with a toy sword. He looked like he was about to hit whatever it was.

"Hey!" Rose stepped forwards when she saw what the boy was doing. "What do you think you're doing?"

The boy heard Rose, stood up and stepped up to her. "I'm gonna beat up this stupid mutt? What are you going to do?" before Rose could respond, the boy knocked her down with his wooden sword.

"Rose!" Chris and Kiyoko cried as she fell over, dazed from the attack.

"I bet you two are with her!" the boy started to step slowly closer to Chris and Kiyoko. They backed away, slightly intimidated by what was going on. Rose, 'Chris' elder sister' had been hit with a toy sword. She was now slightly dazed, not able to stand up. This boy-who-had-hit-her was now advancing on Chris and Kiyoko. The boy was slightly older than the two of them, and they didn't know what to do. "I'm gonna beat you two down until you don't know which way is up!" he threatened.

"K, do something!" Chris whispered at Kiyoko, who was standing slightly in front of him.

"What can I do?" Kiyoko was just as panicked about the situation as Chris was. The two were going to get beaten up in this back alley by a random bully, whom of which they didn't even know, because 'Chris' elder sister' tried to save something that was being threatened by this bully.

Neither of them knew what was going to happen.


	3. Chapter 3

The two backed into a wall, and the bully was still advancing at them. Kiyoko began to hyperventilate. Chris was trying to get her to do something, according to him: 'She had the sword, so she could fight!', but Kiyoko thought differently. In Floor 6, the two had roughly the same abilities and the same techniques; but out of both of them, Chris was the best fighter in the entire Star Pirate Crew, and Kiyoko was a bit less than adequate.

Right now though, Chris was reliant on Kiyoko to do something, and she had to stop panicking. She swallowed, pretending to swallow her fear, to try and get her to focus, to get her breathing steady, to at least try and fight.

She took her sword out from the holster, gripped it with both her hands, and held it in front of her. She put on a brave face, still trying to focus, but her hands were shaking and she couldn't keep a steady, confident looking face.

The bully laughed at her. It was a long, taunting laugh, eyes closed, head facing up and everything. Kiyoko found the thought of the bully taunting her completely infuriating. She had to do something. The bully had been threatening some kind of animal or person, had hit Rose, Chris and herself had been threatened by him, and finally, he was laughing at Kiyoko.

She couldn't take it; the thing that she hated most was being teased, being mocked for being inferior. She had to do something to stop him, and the only thing that she could think of, was hit him. She took a swing, bashing his side. She took another swing, banging his head and knocking him onto the floor.

"Ow! That really hurt! You can keep this stupid dog, I don't even want to hurt him!" the bully seemed suddenly unconfident, suddenly weak. He stumbled away, out of sight.

"It was a dog?" Chris ran through the crowd, over to whatever the bully was threatening. "The poor thing…" he bent over to pick it up. It was a small Cavalier King Charles Spaniel puppy. It was terrified, its tail was in between its legs and it was shivering to no end.

Rose grumbled. She was starting to gain consciousness, and she stumbled up. She apologized for being knocked over, saying that she was caught off guard. But she noticed that the bully was gone, and Kiyoko was holding a wooden sword to eye level, staring at it with total awe, and Chris was in the middle of picking up a small puppy.

"Can we keep it, Rose?" Chris waddled over to Rose, holding the puppy up to his chest. He was pleading, mostly with his eyes.

"Oh, it looks really cute. But we can't, Chris! We barely have enough money for ourselves! With this we'll be flat broke!" Rose patted the dog on the head quickly. She stopped as quick as she had started, not wanting to give the dog much attention.

"Ohh!" he knelt down with the dog in his arms, placing it gently on the floor. "I'm sorry little guy, I really want to keep you! But we can't afford it…" the dog liked him on the nose, and ran down the alleyway, towards what looked like a barn.

Chris looked where the dog was originally cowering. A sheet of paper was lying on the ground, flapping slightly due to the breeze rushing through the alleyway. He knelt down and picked it up. It was a warrant, one of the ones that the guards were looking for!

"This is one of the warrants!" he turned around to Rose, showing off the warrant to her.

"That's great, Chris! Means we only have 4 more to find!" she took it off him. "I'll hold onto the warrants when you guys find them."

Kiyoko had stopped gawking at her sword long enough to realise the situation. The bully had run off, and Chris had found one of the warrants that the guard was looking for. She now felt prepared to continue on with their adventure, now that she felt more in-tune with her weapon.

"I wonder where we can find the next job…" she wandered towards the entrance of the alleyway, looking down it, seeing the barn. There was a man standing outside it, pacing about, like he was having a problem. "What about that guy there? At the barn?" she pointed out the location, getting Chris' and Rose's attention at the same time.

"Sounds like a plan." Rose started running off ahead, towards the barn. Chris grabbed Kiyoko's hand and ran off after Rose. "Keep up you two!" Rose was already heading up the stairwell, nearly at the barn. Chris and Kiyoko had just exited the alleyway, a few yards away from the steps.

"We're coming!" Chris hopped over the wall, serving as a sort of banister for the steps, Kiyoko ran around it, not prepared to hop over it. They stormed up the steps, hearing only part of the conversation between Rose and the concerned looking man.

"-if you could help me I would be very grateful! I would pay you!" the man held out a single gold coin, showing it off to Rose.

Chris let go of Kiyoko's hand and looked inside an open window, into the building. It appeared to be a two-story barn, filled with barrels and wooden boxes. Chris looked through the ceiling boards to the floor above, and saw beetles crawling about.

They were everywhere! On the ceiling, on the walls, on the floors! Even on the stock! Something had to be done! This man's stock was going to be ruined if he wasn't quick about it. He reached into his pocket and took out a small toy pistol, and dived through the window and up to the second floor.

Kiyoko was surprised at Chris' sudden attitude change, although, it was to be expected, he was a teenager after all. Rose hadn't noticed that Chris had dived into the building yet, but she had wondered why the two hadn't started a conversation, and why the concerned man was looking past her, and into his building.

Chris was firing at the beetles with uncanny pinpoint accuracy. Like he had done it before! He never even liked the thought of picking up a gun, he always left the items of business that involved sharpshooting on Floor 6 to Andu, so he never needed to even think twice about stuff like that. But now, here he was, felling every beetle in the building, with a gun, like he was a professional marksman!

Kiyoko was watching from the window, watching Chris through the second story floor-boards. He had such a focused expression across his face; she had never seen him so focused! When she had seen him fighting on Floor 6, he always looked like he was having fun, even when fighting Ruben the HighLander! He was always having fun.

But here, he looked so much more serious. Like the Floor itself had a direct effect on his emotions, on his instinct. His instinct didn't even look like it was there. It looked like he knew what was happening, and knew where to fire. But then again, when he fired at the last bullet at killed the last beetle, it looked like he had just come out of a trance.

His eyes fluttered, he looked slightly dazed, and he stared at his toy gun. "What just happened? How did I get up here?" he looked down to the window, seeing Kiyoko, Rose and the concerned man all looking up at him, mouths a gape. "What?"

Chris ran down the stairway and jumped back out of the window. The trio of shocked individuals applauded him when he landed. Kiyoko had never seen such a feat, especially from Chris, Rose had never thought of Chris to be a sharpshooter, and the concerned man. Well, he just gave Chris the Gold coin and shook his hand.

"Did I kill the beetles?" he looked again at the toy gun, rotating it in his hand, so as he could see every line and dint in the physio. "I did a good job when making this…" he mumbled, making sure that only Kiyoko could understand what he was saying.

"It was all you! But you looked like you were in some kind of trance… Or something." Kiyoko shrugged, seeming happy. They had now acquired two Gold Coins, meaning that they only needed three more to get the music box.

Rose noticed that when the concerned man stepped forward, he had one of the warrants in his back pocket. While he wasn't looking, she pulled it out swiftly, so as to add it to the collection. They were right on track with their little jobs. They were going to collect the coins in no-time! The three fast-walked down the stairs, and turned around the wall.

Chris noticed that the dog that Kiyoko had saved earlier was standing by a trailer, waiting for the trio. Chris ran to him, knelt down and started fussing the puppy. Kiyoko and Rose followed quickly behind. Rose noticed that the dog had picked something up, it was by his paws. She leaned over and picked the sheet of paper up. It was another warrant! Great!

The puppy ran off again, back down the alleyway where it had been rescued. Chris' gaze followed after him, but he didn't chase after him. He was drawn to a domestic skirmish happening between what appeared to be a male drunkard and a woman arguing.

Chris approached them. The drunken man noticed that Chris had stood up towards them, and began bargaining with Chris.

"Magpie stole my wine bottle! I'll pay you a Gold coin if you can get it back for me!" the man was a bit incoherent in his words.

Chris was a little bit disgusted by the man's appearance. He turned his head away slightly and cringed as he smelt the man's breath. "I think you may have had enough, sir…"

"Naw I haven't!" the man tried to step forwards, but he instead stumbled back slightly.

"What's going on, Chris?" Kiyoko stepped over to Chris and whispered to him.

"I'll give you one Gold Coin if you give the wine to me instead of him!" what seemed like the wife of the drunkard butted in.

"Deal!" Chris didn't need a secondary reinforcement. Stopping a negative behaviour such as alcoholism was in itself a Good Deed, and Chris hated the idea of alcoholism anyway. He ran to the left of him, down a smaller alleyway, directly next to the one where Kiyoko had saved the puppy.

Down the small alleyway was a man lying asleep on a small carpet, possibly being used as a blanket. The man was dressed in traditional beggar wear, but it was to be expected, Bowerstone Old Town wasn't the richest place around. Next to the carpet was a bottle of wine, it looked like it had a note stuffed into it.

Chris sneaked over to the bottle of wine, keeping his footsteps silent. Kiyoko ran over quietly, and waited at the start of the alleyway. When Chris was close enough, he reached over to the bottle, and quickly snagged it, still making as little sound as possible.

He back-walked a little bit, keeping his eyes on Magpie, making sure he would not wake him up. He accidently backed into a wall, and snorted upon hitting it. He immediately slapped his free hand onto his face, stopping the sound. Magpie didn't awake, he didn't even make a movement. Chris relaxed, turned around the wall and ran towards the drunkard and his wife. Rose was there by now.

Chris handed the wine to the wife, she accepted it gladly and gave Chris a Gold Coin. She reached inside and found another warrant. Rose quickly accepted that she needed them, and took it off her. Chris thanked them, and walked to the right.

"Feels so good to do Good Deeds." He smiled, leaning on the edge of wall, overlooking the passage between Rookridge and the Bowerstone Cemetery. Kiyoko ambled over and leaned next to him, and Rose next to her.

"We've nearly got all the Gold Coins we need to get Music Box! And then we can wish on it!" Rose flicked through the warrants, "We just need one more warrant and then we're done."

A strong wind blew at Chris, Kiyoko and Rose. A sheet of paper had caught in the updraft that had blown through the town. The paper lazily drifted through the air, flying through the passage. It quickly caught the three's attention. They watched as it flew back and forth, making a pretty pattern as it cute through the atmosphere.

A strong wind caught it, slamming it straight into Kiyoko's face. She stood still for a few seconds, as Chris burst into laughter, followed by Rose, followed by Kiyoko herself.

"That was funny…" she pulled the paper off her face, revealing it to be the last warrant! They had found all five warrants! She quickly handed it to Rose. Chris passed along his two gold coins to Rose, and Kiyoko passed her own along to her as well. "Let's go get the Gold Coin!" they ran off through the alleyway, towards the guard.

Before they could escape through the brooding shadows created by the looming buildings, a man stepped out, stopping their progression. He introduced himself as Arfur, instead of the traditional Arthur. He had a thick, intimidating accent, Kiyoko cowered behind Chris slightly.

"What do you want?" Rose asked cautiously.

"I want those five warrants you got there." He answered quickly, pointing at Rose at the appropriate moment.

"Bad Deed." Chris shook his head and snatched the warrants off of Rose, and made a run for Arfur, lowering himself, preparing to tackle him over.


End file.
